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Monday, May 30, 2016

Award shows like the Emmys can
be very snobby and stick their nose up at superhero shows. The ironic thing is
that Jessica Jones isn’t a superhero
show, not really anyways. Jessica Jones
is a drama that smartly deals with tragedy, rape, power, and PTSD. While
it’s true that the show is based upon a Marvel comic book and co-produced by
Marvel Studios, any semblance of superhero-ness is just an excuse to tell the
deeper and more heartfelt story. The lynchpin holding this story together is
Ritter who plays the titular character. Ritter has always been great on
television from her work from Breaking
Bad to Don’t Trust The B in Apt 23,
but she really brings it in this star making role. It’s a shame the show has
even a whiff of Superhero on it, because chances are, that whiff will cause
Emmy voters to take a pass.

2) Justin Theroux (The Leftovers) HBO

While many of you knew of Theroux before The Leftovers as Mr. Jennifer Aniston, I
knew him as a writer with such projects as Tropic
Thunder and Iron Man 2. But
Theroux really won me over as an actor, bringing such gravitas to this heavy
role. Critically, The Leftovers was a
bigger hit in its second season versus its first, and probably a lot of that
had to do by focusing less on Theroux’s Kevin Garvey and focusing more on The
Murphys in Miracle, Texas, but Kevin was still integral to the show’s stellar
second season, and one of the best television episodes of the year (probably of
the past ten years) was solely regarding a journey of Kevin Garvey. I don’t
know how an Emmy voter can watch International Assassin and not give Theroux
All The Emmys. As great as Theroux was throughout the entire second season of The Leftovers, Emmy voters look at individual submission episodes versus entire seasons. That process will make Theroux's inevitable snub that much more baffling.

Sunday, May 29, 2016

Zack Stentz, one of the co-writers of the Marvel film Thor, recently teamed up with ScreenJunkies, the guys behind the great YouTube channel Honest Trailers, to watch and react to the Honest Trailers version of Thor.
It’s worth a watch for any semi-interested comic book movie fan, as Stentz
offers insight for what it’s like to work for the Marvel machine that heavily
scrutinizes everything you do as they have 10 other films that they need to
worry about and protect. Knowing full well that Loki, Thor’s brother and the
antagonist of the film, was going to return as the villain for their epic Avengers film, it was important for
Marvel that Thor was able to create
an excellent bad guy. What I found most astonishing was that Stentz admitted
that he was told that he needed to “give [them] a villain as good as Magneto”
from the (original) X-Men movies.

It initially struck me as odd that Marvel chose to go with a
character that’s seemingly bland like Magneto. There are so many incredible and
transcendent comic book villains (hell, we were blessed to see Heath Ledger’s
The Joker only a few years prior) that I felt like it was a dumb decision to
settle on Magneto. However, I recently brought this up to a huge comic book
friend of mine (she actually reads comic books and goes to comic book conventions) who
scoffed at the idea of villains that need to be as good as The Joker. That
off-handed comment got me thinking; it’s rare that movie adaptions of superhero
villains are anywhere close to what Ledger gave us in 2008. In my humble
opinion, Heath Ledger gave the greatest acting performance in the history of
cinema. He won a posthumous Oscar for his performance. With that being the
case, why should I have expectations that other superhero villains should be
the same? It’s unrealistic. With that in mind, it is much more realistic (and
better for the mass audience that Marvel caters to) that a villain be “only” be
on par with the great Sir Ian McKellen’s performance of Magneto.

Magneto really was good villain and foil in the Marvel
universe and its inspiration Loki really is one of the best superhero villains
we’ve had. So where does Loki match up in the MCU? Where does he match up among
the explosions of villains we’ve seen since the rise and popularity of these
films? Let’s take a look:

A look at Michael Shannon’s filmography including Take Shelter and Boardwalk Empire will reveal what an amazingly creepy actor Shannon
can play and his role in the underrated Premium
Rush shows you that Shannon can pop off of the screen as the film’s
villain. So why in the hell Shannon’s performance as a major bad guy in a
superhero film never reached Ledger-esque status is beyond me. God Zach Snyder
really does ruin everything, huh?

14) Jacques (Kevin Bacon) Super (2010)

James Gunn, Kevin Bacon, and the stories of real life people
trying to become superheroes will all show up on this list later, but needless
to say, Kevin Bacon is just a National Treasure. He’s so great in everything he
does.

PLOT DEVICE VILLAIN
ELEVATED BY THE FILM’S STORY

13) The Lizard (Rhys Ifans) The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)

For all of the re-treads The
Amazing Spider-Man gave us, the main point of originality the film had was
its villain. We very easily could have had another Dr. Oc or Green Goblin (especially
considering we got yet ANOTHER friggin’ origin story), but instead the film
gave us a new villain that Sam Raimi’s trilogy never gave us before. I enjoyed
how well Ifans Dr. Connors fit within the mythology of Peter Parker and how
well Marc Webb was able to have some sort of grounded realism about a man who
becomes a giant lizard.

12) Ronan (Lee Pace) Guardians
of the Galaxy (2014)

Guardians of the
Galaxy is one of those rare comic book movies where the heroes are more
interesting than the villain. That being said, Lee Pace did a good job as Ronan
and the film accurately portrays him as being so powerful that five heroes and
an army were necessary to defeat him.

THE LONE FEMALE

11) Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway) The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

As great of a director as Christopher Nolan is, his one main
blind spot is writing for females. Yet Oscar-winner Anne Hathaway does a damn
fine job bringing humanity to this character. Selina Kyle is probably not a
villain in the truest sense of the word or the story’s antagonist, but within
the Batman mythology and the context of her role in TDKR, I feel confident putting Hathaway’s performance on this list
and as high as it is.

While the true villain of Kick Ass is probably Mark Strong’s Frank D’Amico, it’s his son
Chris, played by Mintz-Plasse, that is the star bad guy of these features. Kick Ass is from big budget master Matthew Vaughn who gave us X-Men: First Class and Kingsman: The Secret Service. It's a film that helped restart the X-Men franchise and proof of how fun and violent and edgy these films can be. It's like a Marvel film, but better. Like all good superhero stories, it needs to have a memorable bad guy, and Vaughn gave us one thanks to Superbad's break out star.

I haven’t drunk the Winter
Soldier Kool-Aid like the rest of America has, so I’m not terribly sold on
Redford’s performance, but if you’re going to make a political thriller
disguised as a Marvel movie, there’s no better actor you’d rather have your Big
Bad be than King Redford himself.

8) Ultron (James Spader) Avengers:
Age of Ultron (2015)

Marvel has had done some incredible casting over the years,
but having Spader voice Ultron might be the best job it has done so far.

7) Sebastian Shaw (Kevin Bacon) X-Men: First Class (2011)

For some reason, history has largely forgotten X-Men: First Class and its villain
played by Kevin Bacon. My guess is that it’s because it was directed by Matthew
Vaughn as opposed to Bryan Singer, but that’s an odd reason because the reason
that First Class is arguably the best
film in the franchise is precisely BECAUSE it was directed by the great Matthew
Vaughn and not Bryan Singer. Nevertheless, re-watch this film and you’ll notice
in the midst of a litany of great performances like that by Michael Fassbender,
Jennifer Lawrence, and Nicholas Hoult is this now underrated performance by
Kevin Bacon.

THE CONTROVERSIAL
CHOICE

6) Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) Iron Man 2(2010)

There is not a whole lot to like about the sequel to the
smash hit Iron Man, but its lone
bright spot is Rockwell’s performance of Justin Hammer as the evil version of
Tony Stark. On paper, Hammer is solely a plot device and a way to bring
Whiplash closer to Iron Man, but Sam Rockwell is such an amazing performer that
he makes a bland character pop off of the screen. As an actor, Rockwell has the
incredible ability to bring charisma and joy to what’s not written on the page.
It’s what makes him a great actor and it is why Justin Hammer is this high on the list.

CHARISMATIC ACTING
LEGENDS (PART I)

5) The Mandarin (Ben Kingsley) Iron Man 3 (2013)

Even without the great reveal at the end of the film
regarding Kingsley’s character, the Oscar-winner would have forced his way into
the Top 10 no matter what. How Kingsley plays The Mandarin should be the gold
standard for these Marvel films.

4) Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges) Iron Man (2008)

This has now become the minority opinion for some reason,
but the greatest non-Batman superhero film ever made is Jon Favreau’s Iron Man. I remember being dragged to
the movie theater by my college roommate to see Iron Man and leaving the theater in pure awe.
After multiple re-viewings, the film still holds up. Part of the reason of the
film’s creative success is the performance of one of the greatest
living American actors- Jeff Bridges. His performance is really good throughout,
and even better upon re-watching now that you know he’s the mastermind behind
everything.

THE OBVIOUS ICONS

3) Loki (Tom Hiddleston) Thor
/ The Avengers (2011/2012)

If the goal was to create a villain as good as Ian McKellen’s
Magneto, then mission accomplished. Partially for being the bad guy in the now
influential Avengers film and
partially because Hiddleston brings nuance, charisma, and humanity to this
role, Loki has now become one of film’s most iconic villains.

2) Bane (Tom Hardy) The
Dark Knight Rises (2012)

There are a lot of flaws in Nolan’s third film of The Dark
Knight trilogy, and a lot of them do revolve around the film’s antagonist, but
it’s hard to deny just how iconic Hardy’s performance was and how it still resonates
within the zeitgeist. Everyone dresses up as Bane for Halloween and comic
conventions; far less people dress up as Loki. Between the look, the power, and
of course the voice, Bane easily is one of the best villains in this MCU
superhero age.

THE NUMBER ONE BAD
GUY WHO YOU WOULDN’T HAVE SUSPECTED FROM A FILM YOU DIDN’T EXPECT

1) Andrew Detmer (Dane DeHaan) Chronicle (2012)

Sam Rockwell’s Justin Hammer is sure to cause some schisms
and outrage, but I’m sure that far more people are going to have a problem with
Chronicle being #1. Andrew Detmer
certainly is not the most iconic villain on this list, far from it, but Dane
DeHaan’s performance is the only one that could be considered Ledger-esque.

Josh Trank’s Chronicle
is told through Andrew Detmer’s point-of-view, and it tells the story of the
rise of a super-villain that’s disguised as a found-footage movie. It is not
your traditional glossy, summer blockbuster superhero film, but it still is one
of the best superhero films made within the past 15 years. DeHaan’s Detmer,
Michael B. Jordan’s Steve, and Alex Russell’s Matt are high schoolers who gain
superpowers when they discover an asteroid that crash landed near them at a
party one night. Unlike films like Kick
Ass and Super that use the story
point “what if normal people became superheroes?” as an excuse to tell a fairly
normal superhero tale, Chronicle
treats the trope seriously to delve deeply into the psyche of its three main
characters. Chronicle is a character
study first and a superhero film second, which in turns gives us an incredible
performance by DeHaan. Similar to how Buffy
the Vampire Slayer used monsters and the supernatural as an allegory for
high school, Chronicle does something
similar. It uses these character’s newfound superpowers as a way to shine a
light on the caste system in high school.

Dane DeHaan’s Andrew Detmer may not be a flashy or an iconic
choice, but it’s a choice I am going to stick with nonetheless. In an era where
superhero movies blend together, which in turn causes their villains to blend
together, Andrew Detmer stands up from a non-traditional superhero film that
stands out.

NOTE: There are a few superhero films I have not seen yet, most notably Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice and X-Men: Apocalypse, but for the most part, this is a very comprehensive list.

WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITE SUPERHERO VILLAINS? WHAT DID I GET WRONG? LET US KNOW ON OUR FACEBOOK PAGE!

Saturday, May 28, 2016

Two of the best new sitcoms
to be released within the past 12 months are The Ranch, which had its entire first season drop on Netflix on
April 1, 2016, and The Carmichael Show,
which premiered on NBC on August 26, 2015. Tonally and spiritually, these two
shows have nothing in common; however, both shows represent The Ghost of Sitcom
Past. The landscape for sitcoms is remarkably different from what is what when Friends and Seinfeld left the airwaves. Nowadays, sitcoms have to be fully
formed right out of the gate like Unbreakable
Kimmy Schmidt or be able to be traditional with a different perspective
like Black-ish or Fresh Off The Boat. There is seemingly
no room to be good and “working on it” as seen with the recent cancellations of The Grinder and Grandfathered. Yet two sitcoms have recently emerged that have
helped buck this trend, and they have been able to do so in large part by going
back to the original drawing board.

I would recommend reading the nuances and specifics about
the era in Mr. Sepinwall’s book, but the basic tenants of the revolution were
an increase in prestige programming (which in turn led to more serialized
series) which also led to an increase in networks. At the very beginning you
had the three basics, ABC, CBS, and NBC. Over time the number of networks grew.
The Golden Age saw an expansion of networks and having those networks get into
the original programming game. HBO started to produce great original television
content which led other networks like FX, AMC, and Showtime to do the same.
That in turn led to great dramas such as The
Shield, Dexter, and the aforementioned Mad
Men and Breaking Bad.

I know many people would argue that we are still in The
Golden Era of Television. We still have amazing television programming and
television has become more serialized over the procedural nature that it used
to be for decades. The Golden Era has changed things in television and that change
is moving at a rapid pace. Further, what we used to know as television has
almost disappeared.

Sunday, May 22, 2016

Lyndon Baines Johnson, our country's 36th president, is one of my personal favorite presidents. I studied him in depth in my A.P. U.S. History class junior year of high school and was lucky enough to be able to write about him on my A.P. Test. He was thrust into the presidency as a result of one of the most heinous acts ever committed on American soil and managed to pass some of our country's most important legislation, all while fondly whipping out his junk whenever he wanted to. Johnson was a larger than life character onto his own and that's what helped him become a successful president. That is why I found it odd that he seems to have been left behind in the zeitgeist. There are a litany of TV shows and movies all about JFK (and his assassination), but almost nothing about his successor. That is why I have been anxiously awaiting for HBO to release All The Way, a semi-biographical look at LBJ based upon the Tony-award winning play of the same name. Plus, we get to see Bryan Cranston's glorious return to television since Breaking Bad.

The best music covers tend to be
songs that improve on a song with great lyrics but mediocre music behind it.
Bob Dylan’s “All Along The Watchtower” has amazing lyrics because it’s a Bob
Dylan song, but so-so music behind it, well, because it’s a Bob Dylan song.
Jimi Hendrix was able to take those lyrics and, using his incredible talent
as a guitar player, give Dylan’s lyrics the appropriate music they deserved.
The Byrds version of Dylan’s “Tambourine Man” is a similar situation. The same
rule for remaking songs should also be the same rule for remaking movies. A
movie should only be remade if the original is subpar, but has some good stuff
in it.

Disney’s 1967 animated classic The Jungle Book is not a good movie,
certainly not by today’s standards. I have fond memories of the movie from when
I watched it as a kid, but kids are dumb and their tastes can’t be trusted.
Re-watching the 1967 film, I realized what a jumbled mess it is. The film
starts off on the right foot by having the panther Bagheera watch over a
“mancub” Mowgli that he found when the boy was just a newborn that he then has
to protect from the evil tiger Shere Khan. However, the film quickly devolves
as Bagheera and Mowgli set off on their journey out of the jungle and away from
Shere Khan. There’s an extended scene between Mowgli and a pack of elephants
that makes absolutely no sense, Mowgli meets a group of vultures that weresupposed to be voiced by The Beatles, and Bagheera comes and goes as he
pleases.

Disney’s live action version
takes the same basic premise of their 1967 film, Bagheera and Mowgli journey to
find humans to escape the wrath of Shere Khan, and makes a coherent story out
of it. The 1967 animated movie is like a Bob Dylan song, a sub-par whole with
excellent parts in it, and the 2016 version is like Jimi Hendrix who made an
excellent whole that improved on the good parts of the original.

Saturday, May 21, 2016

Fox’s New Girl ended
its fifth season recently where the fictional drinking game True American,
played by the main characters of the show, reared its beautiful head. No one
quite knows what the rules of the game are (although The Internet claims itknows how to play), but the rules are unimportant. The game is an excuse for
the characters to shout random, funny things, and the few True American scenes
we’ve seen throughout the series’ run have always been guaranteed laughs. The
second half of New Girl’s series run has
essentially become a version of its fictional game- random, unstructured,
nonsensical, and really funny.

Back in 2014, my Cord Cutters Podcast host and I werediscussing the series finale of How I MetYour Mother, which led to a discussion of our favorite sitcoms of all time.
I mentioned that New Girl had a
chance to make my Top 5. While it was coming off of a horrendous first half to
its third season, the showhad an
excellent second season to follow up a very good rookie year. I though at the
time that if New Girl could right the
ship and return to the level it was at for its sophomore season, then it had
the potential to be transcendent.